Editor’s Note: Is it possible the top brass is distrubed by the fact more soldiers supported antiwar candidate Ron Paul over any other candidate? See video.

The highest-ranking U.S. military officer has written an unusual open letter to all those in uniform, warning them to stay out of politics as the United States approaches a presidential election in which the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will be a central, and certainly divisive, issue.

“The U.S. military must remain apolitical at all times,” wrote Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “It is and must always be a neutral instrument of the state, no matter which party holds sway.”

Mullen’s essay appears in the coming issue of Joint Force Quarterly, an official military journal that is distributed widely among the officer corps.

The statement to the armed forces is the first essay for the journal Mullen has written as chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and veteran officers said they could not remember when a similar “all-hands” letter had been issued to remind military personnel to remain outside, if not above, contentious political debate.